A Lunger WINS Primus? AND a WS wins Contenders? Somebody call and see if Hell hath frozen over?

_________________A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned - this is the sum of good government.

Thomas Jefferson

One Armed BanditArchMaster Poster

Joined: Apr 15, 2004
Posts: 2778

Posted:
Sun Jul 14, 2013 6:04 pm

Street_Legal wrote:

A Lunger WINS Primus? AND a WS wins Contenders? Somebody call and see if Hell hath frozen over? 8)

Don't get too excited! In both cases, I think TMM had the only warriors left, so there was a guiding hand involved to help these two styles on their path to TCs.

Still, to have a LU and WS go that deep in Primus and Contenders is impressive, nonetheless.

LongshotGrandmaster Poster

Joined: Sep 30, 2012
Posts: 801
Location: Port Moody, BC

Posted:
Sun Jul 14, 2013 7:07 pm

Street_Legal wrote:

A Lunger WINS Primus? AND a WS wins Contenders? Somebody call and see if Hell hath frozen over?

It's part of my prophecy.

I prophesied that if the Consortium got his one thousandth lord protector, the universe will divide by zero, the Kardadhians would become respectable women, and the Great Old Ones will tread the cosmos again.

First sign my prophecy will come true.
A lunger wins Primus.

The second sign:
A wall of steel wins Contenders.

The third sign:
The Consortium has 964 lord protectors now.

The end is near.

NomadArchMaster Poster

Joined: Jun 27, 2006
Posts: 2211
Location: Fargo, ND

Posted:
Sun Jul 14, 2013 10:19 pm

One Armed Bandit wrote:

Street_Legal wrote:

A Lunger WINS Primus? AND a WS wins Contenders? Somebody call and see if Hell hath frozen over?

Don't get too excited! In both cases, I think TMM had the only warriors left, so there was a guiding hand involved to help these two styles on their path to TCs.

Still, to have a LU and WS go that deep in Primus and Contenders is impressive, nonetheless.

I was wondering about that.
I believe a striker was one of the last three in ADM as well.
Interesting results.

Last edited by One Armed Bandit on Mon Jul 15, 2013 6:57 am; edited 1 time in total

MannequinGrandmaster Poster

Joined: Sep 15, 2002
Posts: 909
Location: East Wenatchee, WA

Posted:
Mon Jul 15, 2013 6:50 am

One Armed Bandit wrote:

If anyone knows who got the PS, Innard Skinard, out of the Bloodgames, let me know and I'll update the list!

I believe it was Khisanth.

_________________"Mannequin is my name. I'm the most wanted man on my island, except I'm not on my island, of course. More's the pity."
"Your island"? You mean Sunset?
"Yeah. It's mine".
"You're a madman!"
"Aye, I've come to the right place then."

The ConsortiumArchMaster Poster

Joined: Nov 23, 2002
Posts: 9472
Location: on the golf course, in the garden, reading, traveling, and now Consulting

Congratulations to all of the winners and runners ups. Hoping to have my stuff ready for the next mailer, and thus make it to a F2F in the next year or so.

_________________Show me someone that has never failed, and i'll show you someone who has never attempted to accomplish anything.

The ConsortiumArchMaster Poster

Joined: Nov 23, 2002
Posts: 9472
Location: on the golf course, in the garden, reading, traveling, and now Consulting

Posted:
Tue Jul 16, 2013 1:04 am

FTF Orlando 2013 ... CONSORTIUM PROUD MOMENTS
.
.
.
1. TV Contenders with a TP
2. Wearing the coolest, most colorful shorts of all participants
3. Runner-up Champions (striker) - wanting to kill Pepp
4. Runner-up Initiates (arena lunger, albeit a good one)
and assisting TMM towards his 5 TCs
5. Captaining WORLDs grudge demise of BOB (8-3)
perhaps that was not such a proud moment as it was so easy
6. Being a member of the top kILL table with the most wall tombstones
stimulating Mannequin to 10+ kills, while Crip and us assisted

FTF Orlando 2013 ... CONSORTIUM PROUD MOMENTS
.
.
.
1. TV Contenders with a TP
2. Wearing the coolest, most colorful shorts of all participants
3. Runner-up Champions (striker) - wanting to kill Pepp
4. Runner-up Initiates (arena lunger, albeit a good one)
and assisting TMM towards his 5 TCs
5. Captaining WORLDs grudge demise of BOB (8-3)
perhaps that was not such a proud moment as it was so easy
6. Being a member of the top kILL table with the most wall tombstones
stimulating Mannequin to 10+ kills, while Crip and us assisted

I may have to challenge your claim as the top "Kill Table" as I had 16 myself ....

One Armed BanditArchMaster Poster

Joined: Apr 15, 2004
Posts: 2778

Posted:
Tue Jul 16, 2013 7:10 am

I think this was the first FtF in 8 years that I skipped. I've been trying to dial back my play for a while now and had intended to skip last summer, but they stuck the FtF in Philly (a short train ride away from NYC) and I couldn't justify not going. Winter FtFs are always difficult for me to miss, since my parents live in Prescott and I can combine the FtF with a quick visit with them. So that left Orlando.

Despite not attending, I planned my roster out meticulously. I looked for warriors who worked well on a single strategy/train, even found bust-outs for a couple classes. I had considered accepting one of the many offers from other players to proxy, but everyone is usually so busy with their own warriors, that I planned my crew with Sandy in mind. Good thing I did, because they never got the next round match-ups working on the online newsletters and the cell phone service in the conference room was horrible, so it would've been frustrating and time consuming.

In the end, I settled on a crew of 22 warriors, plus the mail-in Bloodgames. They were broken down into 1 Primus, 2 Contenders, 1 Eligible, 1 ADM, 4 Freshmen, 1 Challenger, 0 Champs, 1 Adept, 4 Inits, 3 Apprentices, and 4 Rookies. STs and TPs were the most represented with 6 and 5 respectively, and I had 0 PR and 0 PS.

Primus

After Sushi Slinger was the sole entry in the mail-in and won the stylemaster award with an 0-5, I knew things weren't going to be easy. Several other managers said they were running their SLs to prevent a repeat, and they didn't lie. After AB and LU, SL was the most represented class in Primus with 8 entries! It was a blast rooting for Sushi Slinger and he managed his best Primus performance so far. After round 3, he was 2-1 and tied with Smelly Socks, but he finished up at 2-3. Smelly Socks went on to win the stylemaster award with a 3-3.

Contenders

Not much to speak of here. My two entries, a WS and TP, went 5-3 and 3-3 in the last tourney, and went 2-3 and 4-3 this tourney. They clearly have some work to do.

Eligibles

This class gave me a nice thrill. My one entry was a Bloodgames BA who was runner-up in the second run-offs of the October 2012 ADM tourney. After round 6, Rirorni Bolognese was 6-0! I was, of course, dreaming of getting a BA TV in Eligibles. That dream lasted precisely three more rounds, until Rirorni was eliminated at 6-3.

ADM

I entered one warrior, a single-21 bust-out TP. My former Challengers TC, Iron Shackle, went 6-3 last January as a sandbagger. Since he performs well with a single strategy against everyone and had only a single 21 to bust, I thought he was ideal for this tourney. I got the 4th WT train to 21 in the arena leading up to the tourney, and had him training an untouched 21 WL during the tourney. What did all that hard work get him? He improved his 6-3 performance from January to a 7-3. Disappointing, to say the least, but as he is my best TP, I want to move him up to Primus as quickly as possible for King of Primus and stylemaster considerations. No great opportunity lost here and he'll be moving along to the Primus arena come November.

Freshmen

Going in, I thought this was my best chance to do well in the tourney. I had two successful sandbaggers at the old Freshmen line, Spare Anchor (TP) and Surly Deckhand (BA), who I nudged a bit higher in skills after the freeze and during this tourney. I also had a sandbagger at the new line, Baked Convincia (Bloodgames WS), who TV'd the old Freshmen on his way past and was now firmly lodged at 145 skills, training CN. My final entry, Raltuman Omelet (ST), was more happenstance than anything. Like Iron Shackle in ADM, I had selected Raltuman Omelet to max out in Primus to compete for stylemaster awards. He was knacky enough to runner-up Inits and TV Adepts in the past, had some nice bonuses going for him (ambi and max endurance bonus), and had super fun favorites (SS, high/mod, Slash/Response). He happened to be at 150 skills at the time of the ADM freeze, and that classed him as Freshmen, looking like this: "striker with ST=14(3) CN=12(3) SZ=11 WT=21 WL=13(4) SP=10 DF=13." Not an ideal set-up, by any stretch, but with three turns to go in Home Guard before the tourney, I trained his DF to 15 to get him to 155 skills and then instructed him to train WT for the entire tournament.

Prior to this tourney, I had 5 runner-ups in Freshmen and 0 TCs. Going in, I expected to be in the mix in the Freshmen run-offs with my 25 ST/25 CN/25 WL sandbaggers, but figured I'd get beat by a late graduate or a Bloodgames ST busting out, like usual. It would be no big loss, since 3 of the 4 warriors would be able to compete in Freshmen again next tourney.

Despite picking up some key WT trains in the arena prior to the tourney, Surly Deckhand petered out at 6-3. Spare Anchor suffered a few losses at the hands of ABs and ended at 9-3-1 (awesome that he got a kill, though). By the end of round 12, there were four competitors remaining. Raltuman Omelet at 12-0, Baked Convincia at 10-2, Sebastian (LHI's zombie AB who recently TC'd Challengers) at 10-2, and Hebee (a BA) at 10-2. Since both of my warriors had already fought Sebastian and one of them had already fought (and lost to) Hebee, Raltuman Omelet and Baked Convincia were matched up. If I had control over things, I would have preferred that Baked Convincia wins so that I have two different warriors to try and beat the victor of the Sebastian/Hebee match. As luck would have it, that's exactly what happened. After round 13, the three remaining warriors were Raltuman Omelet at 12-1, and Baked Convincia and Sebastian at 11-2. Both of my warriors had given one of those losses to Sebastian, but LHI is a smart guy and I figured with each passing fight, he had a better chance of figuring out my attack locations and strategies and how to overcome them.

Luck was again on my side, as Baked Convincia narrowly defeated Sebastian. I had the only two warriors left in Freshmen. What a blast to follow along from home! I still didn't believe it until the next round posted, worried that an input error would send Sebastian back into the tournament and crush my dreams.

The finals pitted my 1 loss ST vs my 2 loss WS. On the one hand, I wanted my ST to win so that I could continue to run the WS in future tournaments. On the other hand, I have never before TC'd with a WS, so that would be a neat notch in my belt if he pulled the upset. In the end, Raltuman Omelet beat Baked Convincia for the TC. An unlikely outcome all around.

Basic

Not much to say about these guys. I entered some mediocre warriors on teams that I wanted to keep advancing the warriors towards ADM (mostly teams with 21-21s that were avoiding tournaments for whatever reason) and they did appropriately mediocre. The closest to glory was an Inits ST named Cutpurse who uses the DA as his weapon. A fun warrior who came up short of a TV at 7-3.

Conclusions

I had no idea what to expect, watching a FtF unfold from home. Would it be boring? Would I wish I was there the whole time? Would I do horrible and regret wasted opportunities?

It turns out that I had a great time! Many of the FtF attendees logged onto Chatzy and kept us updated about what was going on. The newsletters posted quickly and reliably. There were multiple managers following along from home and we kept each other company, cheered on our warriors, and appropriately ooo'd and ahh'd when Pepp received two losses in Champs, when Butch killed Dirty Zealot in Contenders, and when TMM was on the cusp of tying TUM's record 5 TCs in finals match after finals match.

When all was said and done, my 22 entries performed admirably. Their final record was 93-64-2-1 with 3 awards. Even had I not won Freshmen, I would have thoroughly enjoyed the experience, but it was definitely the icing on the cake to break my Freshmen finals losing streak. It turns out that the only guy I can beat in the Freshmen finals is myself! But at least I know how to do it, now.

Thanks to all the managers that offered to proxy for me, even though I didn't take any of you up on it.
Thanks to TDO for informing me that my Rookies scum TP was fighting with no weapons and no armor and submitting a strategy change for him.
Thanks to Marma Duke for posting my kills on the wall.
Thanks to Otto X for his constant presence in Chatzy and his photos to keep us all updated on the tournament.
Finally, thanks to Sandy for doing a bang-up job proxying my warriors. :)

Congrats to TMM on his record-tying five TCs, and congrats to each of the other individual TC winners, Otto X, Khisanth, TUM, HowlinWolf and Mordraith. It was especially heartening to see all of Otto X's hard work pay off in ADM and to see a TC from the newly returned Mordraith. Congrats to the Bloodgames winners, Chief, Mannequin, Khisanth, Grimm, and especially Floyd, who with his two BG graduates continues to excel in the format and is giving Mannequin a run for his money as the most notorious killer in the game.

I've already got my spreadsheets open and have begun planning for the October Mail-In. Looking forward to competing against you all.

One Armed Bandit

Otto_XGrandmaster Poster

Joined: Jan 09, 2003
Posts: 703
Location: Moline, IL

Posted:
Tue Jul 16, 2013 11:06 am

Excellent write-up from OAB there. I'll do a quick recap of my weekend.

Thursday - Arrived in Orlando about 6 PM, and immediately noticed how humid Orlando is. Caught the Super Shuttle to the hotel, getting there around 7:30 with Khisanth. Turns out they gave us the wrong room - single king bed - while we're planning to get four people in there. But since it was just Khisanth and I the first night, it was ok. Met up with TDO, Mrs. TDO and Mannequin in the bar, joined briefly by Crip, Consortium, Sandy and eventually Dr. Feelgood who was staying next door at La Quinta.

Friday - Got them to change rooms for us and they gave us a corner suite, which was huge and really nice. Problem solved. Marmaduke posted on chatzy that he'd brought pizzas from Pizzeria Uno across the street, which drew me to the conference room. It was pretty small but I think still larger than the last Orlando Face. Hotel staff brought in two more tables and that gave everyone a spot, although BOB had five guys crammed around a single table. My table was me, Marmaduke and Floyd. Once RSI got set up we got our arena turns. Verified that my ADM bustout had hit his DF train. Bought some rollups -- nothing spectacular. Picked the five least objectionable and entered them in rookies.

Saturday - Wake up early and get down to the tourney room, only to find nothing is printed. RSI server glitch. Took them a couple hours to sort it out. Turn one prints about 10:30 so we're already behind. My ADM bustout took two losses early (1-2 record), due to me trying to overmanage him, running open handed vs. lungers. I decide to stick to his favorite weapon and go for broke. Floyd makes a Chick-fil-A run for lunch around 2 PM, which was delicious. In the afternoon a lot of my hopefuls get knocked out and some also-rans are doing better than they should. My ADM bustout is still kicking after round 7 at 5-2. I go to bed halfway through round 7 with no undefeateds and all but a couple with two losses.

Sunday - Going into round 8 I have 16 guys left out of 49. Did pretty well in round 8, with 11 left going into round 9. For round ten, I have six running, all on the bubble, and we go 3-3 for three TVs. Fortunately, my ADM bustout is among them at 8-2. Also an adept LU and a rookie AB. The LU is knocked out in round 11 and the rookie AB in round 12, leaving the bustout still going at 10-2. I draw Mannequin's TP for round 13, and after a quick chat with TUM to make sure I'm not being stupid with my strat, turn it in. Beat him in 3 minutes, hitting almost every swing. Round 14 is Crip's LU Ace Frehley. Lungers give me problems but I hope my bustout skills will carry me. I pump up to APM and hope for the best. Fortunately he missed on the first swing and that was it. Round 15 I get Marmaduke's crazy-good striker Warhead, who had nearly beat me in round 12. This fight went a little better, with him missing the first swing and going down quickly. This puts me in the finals vs. Chief's AB Anton Chigurh, an open-hand tank who is incredibly hard to hit, proxied by Marmaduke. As Crip is reading the fight I get nervous because I'm throwing crits on every swing but none of them are connecting. Finally one lands -- and then another. How many will it take? How much does he take? Will my endurance hold out long enough? Fortunately the last three hits are all to the arm, and he quits. Yay - my first TC in ten years! I'm finally off the schneid!

Sunday night grudges I get drafted into "The World" in BOB vs. The World, and my rookie TV gives us one win en route to an 8-3 rout of the BOBs. 17 or so of us go to Fogo de Chao for dinner at 8 PM and stay until they closed. Meat sweats -- goood....

All in all an exhausting yet enjoyable experience. If you haven't ever been to a face, you owe it to yourself to go at least once. Thrill of victory, agony of defeat and all that. Not to be missed.

Joined: Nov 23, 2002
Posts: 9472
Location: on the golf course, in the garden, reading, traveling, and now Consulting

Posted:
Tue Jul 16, 2013 12:26 pm

FLOYD1 wrote:

The Consortium wrote:

FTF Orlando 2013 ... CONSORTIUM PROUD MOMENTS
.
.
.
1. TV Contenders with a TP
2. Wearing the coolest, most colorful shorts of all participants
3. Runner-up Champions (striker) - wanting to kill Pepp
4. Runner-up Initiates (arena lunger, albeit a good one)
and assisting TMM towards his 5 TCs
5. Captaining WORLDs grudge demise of BOB (8-3)
perhaps that was not such a proud moment as it was so easy
6. Being a member of the top kILL table with the most wall tombstones
stimulating Mannequin to 10+ kills, while Crip and us assisted

I may have to challenge your claim as the top "Kill Table" as I had 16 myself ....